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Morning Word
Tax rebate schedule defined
In about a week, the state Taxation and Revenue Department plans to begin issuing direct deposit rebates and mailing paper checks to New Mexicans who filed personal income taxes in 2021. The rebates follow a law enacted by the Legislature returning $500 to individual taxpayers and $1,000 to joint filers and heads of households. Read an FAQ here. All told, the rebates put approximately $690 million back into the pockets of taxpayers. No application is required for those who have already filed. Plus, residents have until May 31, 2024, to file a 2021 return and still qualify for the rebates. Taxation and Revenue Sec. Stephanie Schardin Clarke said at a news conference yesterday the department estimates 935,000 filers are eligible for the rebate, but noted that those who filed by mail and have since changed addresses should update their info at tap.state.nm.us. Those who received refunds via direct deposit will see rebate deposits the same way around June 21, while checks for paper filers will hit the mail between June 20-29. “I would just ask taxpayers to remain patient at the moment,” Schardin Clarke said, noting the state will be closed for Juneteenth on June 19. The state has also established a system for similar “economic relief payments” for low-income residents, though people cannot access both a tax rebate and a relief payment. Apply through the Human Services Department portal here.
Police seek owners of unclaimed property
Four bikes, one cellphone, three cameras, a collection of coins. Are you missing any of these items? The Santa Fe Police Department yesterday issued a list of unclaimed property it plans to put to public auction soon. View the list here. Deputy Chief Benjamin Valdez tells SFR the property might have been lost or abandoned, or even recovered in investigations, but police have exhausted their methods of finding rightful owners. “In years past, we would take anything and everything into safekeeping,” he says. “And that just became a really difficult thing for us to track down whose property it is. We store it for the prescribed time limit, but then we become a storage facility at that point. So we’re trying to really streamline the process. If we know who the property belongs to, then we want to get it back to them.” If you believe you might be the owner of an item, contact the Property/Evidence Section at (505) 955-5007. Proof of ownership is required prior to the return of any items. If none are claimed in two weeks, those estimated at over $50 in value will be auctioned, according to the city’s website.
Wildfire burning in Sandia Mountains
Bernalillo County Fire, Albuquerque Fire and Rescue and the US Forest Service began actively fighting a fire on Sandia Crest Road reported near 10k trail yesterday afternoon. As of an update at 9:30 pm, the fire had burned approximately 3.5 acres and was 0% contained, yet firefighting had stopped “all forward progress.” A Forest Service announcement says communications towers on the crest and agency infrastructure are at risk. Officials have asked people to stay clear of the area. In other fire news, Carson National Forest fire crews are planning to move forward with the Dorado/Cañada del Agua prescribed fire south of Tres Piedras this week. Ignitions could begin as early as tomorrow, depending on weather and on-site conditions. The purpose of the fire, the agency writes, is to “return the ponderosa forest setting to a condition that more closely resembles its natural state, where frequent and low intensity surface fires burn ground fuels and small trees while maintaining an open stand of larger trees.”
Interstate paving commences
Summer would scarcely feel ready to arrive without orange barrels on Interstate 25 and the travel delays they cause. Be warned, therefore: For the next 20 days, the New Mexico Department of Transportation plans a repaving project that will have I-25 down to one lane in each direction through all the Santa Fe exits. Work on the 13-mile stretch between mile marker 277 (south of Cerrillos Road) to 290 (south of Eldorado) is expected to last 20 working days from yesterday and will include new pavement and striping. (Though none of the work appears to have begun as of publication time.) NMDOT says contractor Brasier Asphalt Inc. plans to work from 7 am to 6 pm, six days a week, weather permitting. Have ideas for the NMDOT? Officials are now collecting public comment on the new 2024-2029 Statewide Transportation Improvement Program until July 12.
Listen up
In the sixth episode of SFR’s Leaf Brief podcast, hear journalist Andy Lyman interview musician Brian Monk, who has settled down in Santa Fe and plans to launch a program called Cannabis Higher Education to help explain the basics of terpenes, cannabis ingestion methods and other questions he’s heard as a budtender.
The honeymoon is over
A few months ago, Honeymoon Brewery was eying a distribution expansion that would grow over 18 or 36 months. Now, the five-year-old business that made its name on hard kombucha at Solana Center is closing its doors. Co-owner Ayla Bystrom-Williams tells SFR a combination of long hours and staff shortages contributed to the decision. “We don’t owe people money the way we did during COVID, but the problem is that with a company trying to grow, we just can’t continue the path of always owing money and barely being able to buy ingredients—I don’t know how many times I can do the dance,” she says. “Stepping away from this comes off as a failure, but we’re embracing it as a super-positive thing: We made a great product, built a great brand. This is a healthy decision. You keep telling everyone you’ve got it, you’ve got it—until you don’t got it. Not talking about it hurts you, but we feel really loved. We feel sad because there’s still so much love coming in.” Honeymoon could return in the form of wholesale products soon, as talks are ongoing with other brewers, she says, and some lucky shoppers might find a few products distributed by Admiral Beverages still on store shelves in coming weeks.
Trailblazing tale
A new book published this month by the University of Arizona Press gives trailblazing archaeologist Marjorie Ferguson Lambert the spotlight in a story that crosses into dude ranching and a number of other Southwest career paths more or less off-limits to women in her era. Author Shelby Tisdale, the retired director of the Center of Southwest Studies at Fort Lewis College in Colorado, told interviewers on the Cowboy Up podcast that she landed on Lambert’s tale—and the book No Place for a Lady—after helping her toward the end of her life, when Lambert lived in Santa Fe and her eyesight was failing, and Tisdale worked at the School for Advanced Research. Lambert, born in 1908, was a descendant of a Colorado pioneer family and studied archaeology at Colorado College, then the University of New Mexico. She led college lectures and field sites beginning in her 20s, battling stereotypes along the way. “When she went out to do this she was told by many of her male peers that she would not be able to get any men to work for her, and she proved them wrong,” Tisdale says. A blog post from the press says the book helps readers gain “insight into a time when there were few women establishing full-time careers in anthropology, archaeology or museums. Tisdale successfully combines Lambert’s voice from extensive interviews with her own to take us on a thought-provoking journey.” Read an excerpt here.
Working wind
The National Weather Service forecasts a 40% chance of showers and thunderstorms, mainly after 11 am today. Otherwise, expect partly sunny skies with a high near 79 and west wind 5 to 15 mph, with gusts as high as 20 mph. The agency has deemed this week “Monsoon Awareness Week” and published a series of videos, including this one on dangerous downburst winds.
Thanks for reading! The (Substitute) Word learned that American tourists are visiting Europe at a rate 55% higher than last year and immediately starting daydreaming about cathedrals and museums.
Editor’s note: An earlier version of this story named the wrong holiday on June 19 and has been corrected.
